AusBonsai

Ladies and Gentlemen,

It is with great pleasure that I announce the 3rd annual Australian Native Bonsai Awards.

One of AusBonsai's aims is to increase awareness and use of Australian Native plants as bonsai. To assist this endeavour we hold an annual event with the goal being to encourage and promote the use of our native flora as bonsai.

This year there are 2 categories with 7 awards and prizes will be given as follows:-

Australian Native Bonsai Awards
1st - Carbon steel set of Japanese made bonsai tools in a suede tool roll ($250.00 RRP), A hand drawn sketch of your winning bonsai by Peter Adams (Valued at $150.00) and a certificate.
2nd - Janet Selby limited edition AusBonsai bonsai pot, A signed copy of Bonsai With Australian Native Plants by Dorothy and Vita Koreshoff and certificate
3rd - 42 Mice handmade shohin bonsai pot and certificate

A People's Choice award will also be presented and the winner will be chosen by you, the members of AusBonsai. The recipient of this award will receive a Janet Selby limited edition AusBonsai bonsai pot and a certificate. Voting for this award will take place between 1st July and 8th July 2012 and instructions for voting will be posted towards the end of June.

Australian Native Bonsai in training awards
Stock must be less than 12 months in training and isn't required to be in a bonsai pot
1st - A custom design program* of a possible future design of your winning prebonsai by Peter Adams (Valued at $200.00), A signed copy of Bonsai With Australian Native Plants by Dorothy and Vita Koreshoff and certificate
2nd - Janet Selby limited edition AusBonsai bonsai pot and certificate
3rd - 42 Mice handmade accent pot and certificate

*The design program is a graphic package -- a virtual class on paper -- and it contains future state drawing of the tree in full colour; 'how-to' diagrams that illustrate the points made and the steps to take; supporting text and horticultural notes on the species or suggestions as to where these might be had.

The panel of judges this year consists of Peter Adams of Washington State in U.S.A, John Marsh of New South Wales and Andrew Ward from South Australia. This will bring an interesting dynamic to the judging by seasoned and accomplished artists.

Eligibility and requirements:
• The bonsai must be an Australian native
• The bonsai must be part of the submitting artists personal collection
• Trees entered in previous years are eligible for entry again however a new and updated picture must be submitted

How to submit your material:
• You may submit as many times as you like by posting a new topic in the special AusBonsai Australian Native Bonsai Awards 2012 forum
• You must use the correct PREFIX to specify the CATEGORY you are entering. [ANBA] for Australian Native Bonsai Awards and [ANBITA] for Australian Native Bonsai in training awards. Examples:
[ANBA] Casuarina cunninghamiana
[ANBITA] Melaleuca linariifolia - 11 months training
• Photographs must be of good quality, be a minimum of 500 x 500 pixels and in full colour.
• Photographs must be taken in front of a plain background.
• Photographs are to be uploaded to AusBonsai and not linked from other sites.
• A brief history of the bonsai should be submitted (max 450 words).
• Botanical and/or common name of tree, years of training, size (height and width), name of artist (may be your AusBonsai screen name) and state or territory of artist must be included.

Review and Judging:
• Submissions will initially be reviewed by the Moderators of AusBonsai for compliance with the above requirements.
• Judging will be via an average point score and will be conducted by Peter Adams, John Marsh and Andrew Ward.
• Photography is not being judged however the best possible picture/s should be submitted. Review our section on photographing bonsai for tips. In previous years there were several stunning trees submitted that did not score as well as they should have due to poor presentation.
• Point scoring will be based on the following criteria: -
1. Horticulture - 10%
2. Aesthetics - 30%
3. Design, image and presentation - 60%
Although you may not agree with the judge’s decision, the process will be fair and structured. 3 highly experienced and accomplished artists with 3 different subjective opinions. As in all competitions, the judge’s decision is final and must be treated with respect.

A brief note on judging from a previous judge, Roger Hnatiuk.

Judging any form of art will always be a contentious issue and please keep in mind that trees, particularly Aussie natives, don't grow according to rigid rules. We are not saying that your tree must be styled like a native found in the bush. Judging is about looking at the composition as a whole and asking oneself if it is pleasing to look at. Then, why is it so (either pleasing or not pleasing). Then one can look to see whether there are apparent technical 'faults' and whether these make any difference to the enjoyment of the composition as a whole. If we used a strict format for judging we would always end up with the same winner and that is not art!

Final date for submitting entries will be midnight on 30th June 2012. Results will be published on AusBonsai.com.au by 14th July 2012.

I'd be very grateful if you could assist by promoting the Australian Native Bonsai Awards to your Clubs, Schools, bonsai friends or on Facebook etc.
If you are able to arrange for a banner to be placed on any bonsai website, please right click the file below and save it to your computer. You can then forward it to webmasters and request them to place it on their respective sites with a link back to this topic.


Australian Native Bonsai Awards BANNER

Alternatively, the following file is an A4 sized posters that can be printed and placed on notice boards or downloaded and emailed to friends. Have fun and best of luck!

Regards,
Steven

THE FINE PRINT:
Contest void where prohibited by law.
By submitting your entry, you agree to grant AusBonsai.com.au and the Australian Plants as Bonsai Study Group permission to publish and display your submitted picture/s and text.
Winners will be notified via publication in this forum on or before 14th July 2012.
Prizes will be posted worldwide upon receipt of postal address (by PM to Steven - no addresses will be made public)

Could I please ask a question? with the ANBITA catagory, can you post more than 1 picture showing progress of different angles?

Steve W

G'day Steve,

Post as many photos as you like. The more the merrier. Just make sure they are as high quality as you can take. Plain background, focus, composition, correct angle, stand etc.
I'm looking forward to your submissions.

Regards,
Steven

Hi Steven , fantastic effort sourcing prizes mate, i'm looking forward to seeing what tees are entered this year

Sorry if this is a stupid question, but this is a competition for trees judged as they are on or before June 30th? What I mean by that is, is it different to the shohin comp where everyone started with undeveloped/raw stock and the final product is judged? In this comp you could start training a tree now to enter, or you could enter one you have had for 20 years??

Thanks

Hi Luke the competition closes on June 30th. The trees are as they are now or when you photograph them before the closing date. The 2 categories cover either established trees [ANBA] or trees with less than 12 months training [ANBITA]

Good luck if you decide to enter

looks like a great initiative...would love to get involved.

I might have to get me a native i here sheoaks an callistamins can take a beating when collected only trouble is finding a spot i can collect a native with out being shot by the council

There is now only a little under 4 weeks to go to get your entries into the ANBA12.

Don't leave it to the last minute...

Trying to get over this bloody lurgy thing, so I can lift the trees for cleaning and picture taking.


Pup achoooo

Hi Everyone

It is terrific to see some lovely trees up for presentation at present. I'm looking forward to seeing the competition develop ... isn't it great that our own Aussie trees have their own comp?

Good luck everyone
Andrew

Hi down there,

Thought I'd like to get an early comment in on the tree pics but see Andrew got in first! Really nice trees -- this is going to be a tough competition!
I am really keen on Aussie natives anyway and you finding ways to express them as Bonsai is terrific!

Regards ... Peter Adams

in reference to future ANBITA competition entries does trunk chop or air layering count as start of training for the 12months??... I have some salvaged potted trees that are still trees. They are from my mother in law never intended as bonsai, just want to clarify so i know were i stand for 2013/2014 .... thanks

Rin


J

Can you clarify 'In training', as I collected a tree from the wild December 2010, and as such it was trunk chopped and root pruned to fit into a grow pot. The selection, devlopment and wiring of branches wasn't started until August 2011. Is the initial collection, trunk chop and root prune and regrowth, before August 2011 concidered part of training.

chris

Chris, I would say fitting the collected tree into it's new pot was part of the collection duties. Then in August 2011 you started training the tree, . ""This would be classed as in training since August.""
To clarify- the rhaphiophylla i entered,, collected August 2011 but really it has only been trained since i chopped it the other night, so when i wrote 11 mths training no, only however many days trained since i cut back and wired. I was being overly generous with the training time

hope that helps Chris